Bam White Character Analysis in The Worst Hard Time

A migrant who became stranded with his family in No Man’s Land due to his horses starving during the trip south. They were migrating from Animas, Colorado to Littlefield, Texas—a town near Amarillo, Texas. The Whites arrived in Dalhart, Texas on February 26, 1926 and decided to settle there, becoming nesters. White first worked as a sharecropper. He believed that excessive plowing had caused the incessant dust storms that devastated the plains. In the 1930s, he was featured in the documentary, The Plow That Broke the Plains.

Bam White Quotes in The Worst Hard Time

The The Worst Hard Time quotes below are all either spoken by Bam White or refer to Bam White. For each quote, you can also see the other characters and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:

Westward Expansion and the Settlement of the Southern Plains Theme Icon

The land hardened. Rivers that had been full in spring trickled down to a string line of water and then disappeared. That September was the warmest yet in the still-young century. Bam White scanned the sky for a “sun dog,” his term for a halo that foretold of rain; he saw nothing through the heat of July, August, and September. He noticed how the horses were lethargic, trying to conserve energy. Usually, when the animals bucked or stirred, it meant a storm on the way. They had been passive for some time now, in a summer when the rains left and did not come back for nearly eight years.

Related Characters: Bam White

Related Symbols: Wheat

Page Number and Citation: 102

Explanation and Analysis:

Bam White Character Timeline in The Worst Hard Time

The timeline below shows where the character Bam White appears in The Worst Hard Time. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.

...from the high desert chill of Las Animas, Colorado to Littlefield, Texas, south of Amarillo.” Bam White was a ranch hand who went to Texas to find work, either managing cattle... (full context)

The White family arrived at the XIT ranch—a place that Bam White had heard stories about all his life. It was part of the vast grassland... (full context)

Environmental Devastation and the Dust Bowl Theme Icon

...to their own free-wheeling hedonism. By 1912, all cattle-ranching had ceased on the XIT. When Bam White arrived with his family, “only 450,000 acres were unplowed of the original three-million-acre XIT... (full context)

Bam White toured the town. Near the railroad switch tower there was a two-story sanitarium—the only... (full context)

During conversations with locals, Bam found out that Dick Coon “owned Dalhart.” Coon owned nearly every establishment in Dalhart, including... (full context)

When Bam returned to his family, he found his horse dead. Bam took it as a sign... (full context)

Bam White lived in “a shack outside of Dalhart” where he worked as a sharecropper in... (full context)

In 1930, Bam White and his family still lived in the shack he had rented shortly after they... (full context)

Due to his dark skin and work-worn hands, Bam did not always feel welcome in Dalhart, where people wore “new clothes and [dined] fine... (full context)

With enough money saved, Bam finally bought a house. It was a “half-dugout.” The roof was made of tarpaper, and... (full context)

Then, the land hardened. The grain toasted in the heat. Bam White looked in the sky, scanning it for a “sun dog,” a phrase he used... (full context)

...“like coarse animal hair.” It moved up the Texas Panhandle, toward Oklahoma, Colorado, and Kansas. Bam White thought that he was looking at a moving mountain range, despite the Llano Estacado... (full context)

Bam White continued to sell skunk hides and worked odd jobs. Otherwise, he spent much of... (full context)

...Lizzie had been talking about leaving Dalhart. She was crumbling emotionally, but they could not leave—Bam was too old. Meanwhile Melt had just found out from an aunt about his indigenous... (full context)

...he reached Dalhart, he asked if anyone knew an old cowboy, and people gave him Bam White’s name. White was perfect for the part. Lorentz offered to pay him twenty-five dollars—two... (full context)

Economic Hardship and Lessons of the Great Depression Theme Icon

...was shown alongside It Happened One Night. In Dalhart, it opened at the Mission Theater. Bam White took his family, and it was the first time Melt had ever seen a... (full context)

People in Dalhart shunned Bam White for being in a film that made it seem as though the nesters were... (full context)

...corn and some grass on a section of ground outside of their small, two-room house. Bam planted alfalfa so that he would have hay for his horses. The rain came in... (full context)

In early summer, there were a few storms. Bam White’s small patch in the front of his house grew into “a blanket of green... (full context)

Lizzie White feared starvation, as grasshoppers ate everything Bam had planted. The family got government clothes and food. The winter was harsh and Bam... (full context)

...was a lonely place in his last years. He missed Dick Coon, John McCarty, and Bam White. He did not know the new people in town, who were mostly workers from... (full context)

Bam White Character Analysis

Bam White Quotes in The Worst Hard Time

Chapter 6 Quotes

Bam White Character Timeline in The Worst Hard Time